tonight on "nightline," kennedy love story. ininhose newly unearthed tapes heard for the first time tonight, jacqueline kennedy tells the inside story of the love affair with her husband, the president. >> life with him was always so fast. but it isn't until you look back that you see what happened when.

>> tonight, a a ane sawyer special report. plus, jackson family secrets. michael jackson's brother jermaine finally tells his side of the family story. from his secret plan for smuggling the star out of the country to his touching tribute at michael's funeral. ♪ smile though your heart is aching ♪ and, the hero gene? an incredible bystander rescue. but it's hardly the first. so, what is it about some humans that make them capable of super-human action? >> announcer: from the global resources of abc news, with terry moran, cynthia mcfadden and bill weir in new york city, this is "nightline."" september 13th, 2011. >> good evening, i'm cynthia mcfadden. we begin tonight with an abc news exclusive. a unique look inside camelot. the story as told by the first

lady about her husband, the president. the details are in those never before released tapes, made by jacqueline kennedy just four months after john f. kennedy's assassination. we're hearing them tonight, nearly 50 years after they were recorded. and abc's diane sawyer joins us. diane, what surprised you the most the first time you heard those tapes? >> well, i think, cynthia, and i'm sure this was true for you too, the most surprising thing of all was she did the tapes. we only saw the sunglasses and the smile. we never expected to learn what was behind it. but now we know, from these tapes, that she was irreverent, that she spoke very personally, including about who she was inside this very famous marriage. they are one of the most romanticized couples in american history. of their lives, their marriage, always hidden behind the curtains of camelot. >> life with him was always so

fast. but it isn't until you look back that you see what happened when. >> reporter: now, for the first time, from the tapes, we know what she thought when she first met him. >> jack was young and loved, you know, everything. >> reporter: it was a dinner party. she was a photographer for the society pages of a newspaper. she was dazzled by him. >> jack was the most unselfconscious person i've ever seen. he just naturally could be attractive in a crowd or a room. >> reporter: their daughter, caroline kennedy. is there one phrase in the whole tapes that you think about the most? >> well, probably when she says of the white house, these were our happiest times. >> i is funny, i used to worry about going into thehehite house. it will be a goldfish bowl, the secret service, i'll never see my husband. but then we found out it was really the happiest time of my life.

is was when we were the closest. >> reporter: after all, she arrived at the white house an unlikely political wife. refined sensibilities. a love of privacy. no one thought she was an asset. >> i was always a liability to him. everyone thought i was a snob from newport who had bouffant hair and had french clothes and hated politics. he knew i was being myself and that i did like to stay in the background. i think he appreciated that in a wife. and he married me really for the things i was. >> reporter: beautiful, gracious and an ardent student of history. together, they read about all the great civilizations and dreamed of changes in america. and she says on the tapes he loved that, most of all, she was devoted to making him happy. >> you know, jack -- i think a woman always adapts. and especially if you're very young when you get married.

you know, unformed. you really become the kind of wife that you can see that your husband wants. >> reporter: she says if she couldn't help him on politics, she could keep harmony at home. >> i think it's so good to be able to forgive quickly. i know that's a quality that jack liked in me, being married. that if ever there would be e slight little, you know, cloud, i'd always be -- i'd rush and say, oh, dear, did i upset you, did i say something wrong, i'm so sorry, or -- and he loved that. >> reporter: she tried not to of the day, but remembers one es time she asked about vietnam. >> and it was at the end of the day and he said, oh, my god, he on me all day. that, you know, and i just -- he'd just been swimming at the pool and sort of changed into his happy evening mood and he said, don't remind of that all over again.

and i just felt so criminal. and i decided, everyone should be trying to help jack in whatever way they could. >> reporter: and remember, it is 1964. still someplace between the traditions of the path and the independence of the future. on the tapes, in her famously breathy voice, she tries to analyze different kinds of women. >> this is just my own sort of psychology, but jack so obviously demanded from a woman a relationship between a man and a woman, where a man would be, you know, the leader and a woman would be his wife, look up to him as a man. i always thought women who were scared of sex loved adelaide. >> reporter: she's talking about the women who criticized her husband and supported democrat adelaide stephenson. who ran for president and lost. >> the challenge. >> yeah, not that there would be a challenge with jack but it was a different kind of man. so -- you know, all these sort of twisted, poor little women

whose lives hadn't worked out could find a bomb in adelaide. and jack made them nervous. someone said, where do you get your opinions? and i said, i get all my opinions from my husband, which is true. how could i have any political opinions? his were going to be the best. it was really kind of victorian relationship which we had which i think is the best. >> reporter: but the woman who started out so shy would ultimately find her voice. >> we should cherish the language and emotions that unite us all. >> reporter: dazzling other countries in the world on behalf of america. becoming one of the political stars. >> i am the man who accompanied jacqueline kennedy to paris. and i've enjoyed it. >> i think that as she became a greater and greater asset in the world, as well as that they became closer.

>> reporter: do you thininit surprised him how she emerged in the white house? suddenly? >> i think it surpriseseher. >> i rather love this hall. oh, the white house television tour he used to watch all the time. he was so sweet the way he was proud of me. suddenly everything that had been a liability before, and we got in the white house, all the things that i'd always done suddenly became wonderful. and i was so happy for jack that he could be proud of me then. those were our happiest years. >> reporter: in the years to come, the rest of us would read about other women, wonder about this marriage. she makes it clear, the two of them lived for their children and each other. was she happy? >> well, i think she really y s happy. and i think she really was -- she loved my father and i think she knew that he loved her. >> the book, "jacqueline kennedy: historic conversations

on life with john f. kennedy" comes out tomorrow. our thanks to diane. and just ahead, his moments on stage with brother michael at the motown reunion were the best of times. now, jermaininjackson shares secret scenes from his brother's final days. she's had these shoes a long time. they're kind of my thing. and they were looking... nasty. vile.

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>> announcer: "nightline" continues from new york city with cynthia mcfadden. >> and now, financial news regarding the estate of michael jackson. the executors say, since the star's death, the estate has earned a whopping $310 million, enough to pay off the singer's debts and today they reveal their intention to distribute $30 million to a trust for his

kids. also today, the executors said that jackson's mother, katherine, wants to sell the family's famous encino estate, the very place chris connelly sat down with an exclusive interview with michael's brother jermaine. ♪ beat it ♪ beat it >> reporter: michael jackson's "beat it." just one of the songs that first came to light here, at the jackson family home in los angeles, as jermaine jackson recalls. >> hear all the stuff, it was >> reporter: on stage, jermaine always supported his superstar brother. 2005 brought a switch. with michael being tried on sexual molestation charges. jermaine now wanted to keep him from facing the music. there was a plane, it could have been at a nearby airport. where would it have taken mike snl. >> we would have gone to the middle ooeeast, to bahrain.

>> reporter: trusting in the injury, he says, jermaine never activated his astonishi ining p revealed for the first time in his new book, "you are not alone." they would have put you in prison for the rest of your life if they caught you doing that. >> they wouldn't have caught me. they would haven't caught me. >> reporter: a new trial now occupy's jermaine's attention, as dr. conrad murray faces a manslaughter charge for allegedly administering a dose of the anesthetic prop foul that caused michael's death in june 2009. who do you hold responsible for your brother's death? >> prop foul. >> reporter: i didn't ask you what. i asked you who. >> prop foul and the doctor. he had a responsibility of keeping michael jackson alive. alive. >> reporter: instead, there are only memories. motown 25 in 1983. singing "i'll be there." ♪ i'll be there to comfort you >> reporter: only then, as

jermaine's book chronicles, michael wasn't there at all. you say that from 1984 to 1992, you saw michael maybe three times a year during that period? >> yes. >> reporter: why didn't he want to see you, jermaine? >> it's not that he didn't want to see me. >> reporter: he could have picked up the phone and seen you any time he want. >> no, michael doesn't -- can you imagine him having a phone? it's like a person having a cell phone. how are you going to service everybody? i was busy, too. could have been a lot of influence from outside people, saying, your family's going to hold you back. it's not that he didn't wanan t see us. it's getting caught up into wanting to be the best, surrounded by a lot of people who don't care about us. >> reporter: the family discipline that forged their success left michael with conflicted feelings about joe jackson, the father they called joseph. michael asks you, would you cry if joseph died? what did michael sail after he

asked you that question? >> he said he don't know if he would or he wouldn't. >> reporter: you said you were haunted by the screams of michael the first time he was hit by your father with a switch. >> not so much of petrified but just the excitement of him not understanding what it means. he wanted to show us, i care about you. even if i have to whip your butt, i care about you. i'm going to keep you off those streets. we wouldn't want to be raised any other way. i'll tell you why. because we have so much respect for him, our mother and so much respect for people. it's that people -- they don't understand that it's hard

raising nine kids, bringing them from indiana out here and keeping them together. >> michael jackson has died in los angeles this afternoon. >> reporter: for jermaine, there would be more than enough tears ononune 25th, 2009. >> to hear my mother say he's dead, to hear her say this -- i lost it. >> reporter: amid a frenzy at the hospital, jermaine hugged his mother then took one last look at michael. >> and there he was laying there and la toya was there before us and he was lifeless. i touched his forehead, his face and it was still soft and i kissed him, i pulled his eyeballs to look into his eyes and i told him how much i love him and i'm going to misss you o much. and the kids came in and they were, you know, daddy, please, wake up, daddy -- but it was

important for them to see him to get it over with. >> reporter: two years later, there is reason for encouragement. michael's kids spend time here? >> yeah, they were all here before they went up to the new place. >> reporter: who is looking after them now? >> my mother and staff and my kids are with them every day and they are just being kids. if there's a new animation movie out, they got to go. and it's not a home theater, they go to the public theater. they're having fun. >> reporter: i'm chris connelly for "nightline" in los angeles. [ male announcer ] sitting, waiting, hoping. that's not how successful investing is done. at e-trade it's harnessing some of the most powerful yet easy to use trading tools on the planet to help diversify, identify opportunities, take action. it's using professional grade research and your brain to seek maximum returns to reach your goals. it's investing with intelligence and cold hard conviction. you made the money. you should have everything you need to invest it.

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well, hero is a word we use a lot these days. tonight, abc's john donvan tries to sort out the real heros from the rest. >> reporter: no matter how many times you've seen it by now, it still takes a few seconds to realize that there are two things going on here. one is a rescue, because they got that guy out from under the car after his motorcycle collided with it. and the other, and start again and more slowly this time, there is a reflect on the part of all of those people who rushed no to help, to set aside the fact they could die trying to save this man from dying. in other words, they did not have to do this. unless you consider it an involuntary reflex. and it didn't take long to hear the word used. >> they are heroes. >> reporter: heros, that from the uncle of the man under the car. but does the word fit this time? the word hero gets used an awful

lot. football players are called heroes. miners trapped underground are called here ropes. rescue teams that free kicks stuck in pipes are calledere ropes. but to earn the word, there has to be a choice involved. to put yourself in danger. so, football -- not enough danger. the miners -- they had no choice. the men who pull kids from pipes? they're not really in a lot of danger. even sully, as 's nouknown, the pilot that landed that plane on the hudson, he's never seemed comfortable with the word hero. he knows that landing the plane safely was part of his job. and he never chose to be there. but then there's 1982, a jet down in the ice with potomac river. survivors being plucked from the water. but this passenger was fading and going under. and from the shore, a passer by, his name is lenny, he just went for it. he chose to do this. he risked himself, he saved a life. al